U.S. Effort Seeks to Turn Iraqis Against Zarqawi

[ECH1969]

Military is conducting a propaganda campaign to paint Jordanian and loyalists as a foreign threat to stability, documents and sources say.

The documents state that the U.S. campaign aims to turn Iraqis against Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian, by playing on their perceived dislike of foreigners. U.S. authorities claim some success with that effort, noting that some tribal Iraqi insurgents have attacked Zarqawi loyalists.

There has been a running argument among specialists in Iraq about how much significance to assign to Zarqawi, who spent seven years in prison in Jordan for attempting to overthrow the government there. After his release he spent time in Pakistan and Afghanistan before moving his base of operations to Iraq. He has been sentenced to death in absentia for planning the 2002 assassination of U.S. diplomat Lawrence Foley in Jordan. U.S. authorities have said he is responsible for dozens of deaths in Iraq and have placed a $25 million bounty on his head.

Some senior intelligence officers believe Zarqawi's role may have been overemphasized by the propaganda campaign, which has included leaflets, radio and television broadcasts, Internet postings and at least one leak to an American journalist. "When we provided stuff, it was all in Arabic," and aimed at the Iraqi and Arab media, said another military officer familiar with the program, who spoke on background because he is not supposed to speak to reporters. But this officer said that the Zarqawi campaign "probably raised his profile in the American press's view."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/

[bemildred]

1. Another bizarre story.

"said another military officer familiar with the program, who spoke on background because he is not supposed to speak to reporters"

So, he (the officer) is (supposedly) violating his orders? In order to share this drivel with us?

[ECH1969]

2. Leaking has become a sport now adays

[bemildred]

3. These peoples main functions in life are:

a.) To keep us confused
b.) To feed us bullshit

[Rose Siding]

4. Direct link-

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040900890.html

"Magnify" for the "home audience", huh? They've tried to play us by design.

snip>
The military's propaganda program largely has been aimed at Iraqis, but seems to have spilled over into the U.S. media. One briefing slide about U.S. "strategic communications" in Iraq, prepared for Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, describes the "home audience" as one of six major targets of the American side of the war.

That slide, created by Casey's subordinates, does not specifically state that U.S. citizens were being targeted by the effort, but other sections of the briefings indicate that there were direct military efforts to use the U.S. media to affect views of the war. One slide in the same briefing, for example, noted that a "selective leak" about Zarqawi was made to Dexter Filkins, a New York Times reporter based in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about a letter supposedly written by Zarqawi and boasting of suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the Times front page on Feb. 9, 2004.

Leaks to reporters from U.S. officials in Iraq are common, but official evidence of a propaganda operation using an American reporter is rare.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

5. What stupidity. They should have done that long ago....

...because the U. S. military is Enemy #1 for the Iraqis. Nothing is likely to change that for a very long time.

[ECH1969]

6. I didn't think about it that way

[tandot]

7. U.S. military plays up role of Zarqawi (propaganda to tie war to 9/11)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12243324/

The U.S. military is conducting a propaganda campaign to magnify the role of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, according to internal military documents and officers familiar with the program. The effort has raised his profile in a way that some military intelligence officials believe may have overstated his importance and helped the Bush administration tie the war to the organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

........

Some senior intelligence officers believe Zarqawi's role may have been overemphasized by the propaganda campaign, which has included leaflets, radio and television broadcasts, Internet postings and at least one leak to an American journalist. Although Zarqawi and other foreign insurgents in Iraq have conducted deadly bombing attacks, they remain "a very small part of the actual numbers," Col. Derek Harvey, who served as a military intelligence officer in Iraq and then was one of the top officers handling Iraq intelligence issues on the staff of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told an Army meeting at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., last summer.

[Pirate Smile]

8. Faux news and a leak to a NYT reporter are mentioned. It is a WP story.

Military Plays Up Role of Zarqawi
Jordanian Painted As Foreign Threat To Iraq's Stability

By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 10, 2006; Page A01

The U.S. military is conducting a propaganda campaign to magnify the role of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, according to internal military documents and officers familiar with the program. The effort has raised his profile in a way that some military intelligence officials believe may have overstated his importance and helped the Bush administration tie the war to the organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The documents state that the U.S. campaign aims to turn Iraqis against Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian, by playing on their perceived dislike of foreigners. U.S. authorities claim some success with that effort, noting that some tribal Iraqi insurgents have attacked Zarqawi loyalists.


For the past two years, U.S. military leaders have been using Iraqi media and other outlets in Baghdad to publicize Zarqawi's role in the insurgency. The documents explicitly list the "U.S. Home Audience" as one of the targets of a broader propaganda campaign.

-snip-
Another briefing slide states that after U.S. commanders ordered that the atrocities of Saddam Hussein's government be publicized, U.S. psychological operations soldiers produced a video disc that not only was widely disseminated inside Iraq, but also was "seen on Fox News."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040900890.html

[tandot]

10. Fox News...who would have thought?

:sarcasm:


The disgusting thing is that all that propaganda apparently worked. Some ignorant morons still believe that Iraqis were responsible for 9/11.

[lovuian]

9. Notice they don't like to say OSAMA BIN LAUDIN

anymore because they haven't caught him in 5 years...

Zarquari is easier to demonize...

[ECH1969]

11. Duplicate thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2217528

[tandot]

13. Sorry...MSNBC had a different headline and I did not see

that the WP headline deals with the same article.

However, I think the MSNBC headline is more truthful. The propaganda is geared toward Americans, to make it seem like the Iraq war is part of the "war on terror"

edit for spelling

[ECH1969]

14. That is fine its no problem

[TomInTib]

12. Rober Fisk thinks this Zarqawi thing is bs..

Now quite apart from the fact that many Iraqis - along, I have to admit, with myself - have grave doubts about whether Zarqawi exists, and that al-Qai'da's Zarqawi, if he does exist, does not merit the title of "insurgency mastermind", the words that caught my eye were "US authorities say". And as I read through the report, I note how the Los Angeles Times sources this extraordinary tale. I thought American reporters no longer trusted the US administration, not after the mythical weapons of mass destruction and the equally mythical connections between Saddam and the international crimes against humanity of 11 September 2001. Of course, I was wrong.

Here are the sources - on pages one and 10 for the yarn spun by reporters Josh Meyer and Mark Mazzetti: "US officials said", "said one US Justice Department counter-terrorism official", "Officials ... said", "those officials said", "the officials confirmed", "American officials complained", "the US officials stressed", "US authorities believe", "said one senior US intelligence official", "US officials said", "Jordanian officials ... said" - here, at least is some light relief - "several US officials said", "the US officials said", "American officials said", "officials say", "say US officials", "US officials said", "one US counter-terrorism official said".

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12395.htm

[Charlie Brown]

15. Zarqawi is Keyser Soze n/t

[NYC]

24. If we smash a coffee cup,

will this end?

[domlaw]

16. U.S. military plays up role of Zarqawi

The U.S. military is conducting a propaganda campaign to magnify the role of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, according to internal military documents and officers familiar with the program.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12243324/

When did this sink in, after catching his "second in command" 20 times.

[TomInTib]

17. Robert Fisk says this "Zarqawi" thing is bs..

Now quite apart from the fact that many Iraqis - along, I have to admit, with myself - have grave doubts about whether Zarqawi exists, and that al-Qai'da's Zarqawi, if he does exist, does not merit the title of "insurgency mastermind", the words that caught my eye were "US authorities say". And as I read through the report, I note how the Los Angeles Times sources this extraordinary tale. I thought American reporters no longer trusted the US administration, not after the mythical weapons of mass destruction and the equally mythical connections between Saddam and the international crimes against humanity of 11 September 2001. Of course, I was wrong.

Here are the sources - on pages one and 10 for the yarn spun by reporters Josh Meyer and Mark Mazzetti: "US officials said", "said one US Justice Department counter-terrorism official", "Officials ... said", "those officials said", "the officials confirmed", "American officials complained", "the US officials stressed", "US authorities believe", "said one senior US intelligence official", "US officials said", "Jordanian officials ... said" - here, at least is some light relief - "several US officials said", "the US officials said", "American officials said", "officials say", "say US officials", "US officials said", "one US counter-terrorism official said".

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12395.htm

[IndianaGreen]

18. More proof that we shouldn't believe anything we are told

either by the military or the civilians in the government.

Zarqawi is one the many Emmanuel Goldsteins of the Bush regime!

[wookie294]

19. The 35%ers will believe this CRAP

All efforts in the White House are geared toward preventing Bush's poll numbers from sinking into the 20s. To date, at least 35% of Americans are either die-hard Bush supporters or just plain stupid. If five or six percent of those morons become convinced Bush is a liar, we will see his rating dip into the 20s. Keep talking to your neighbors, friends, strangers and EVERYONE about Bush's lies. We will win this!!! Take him down into the 20s!!!!

How US fuelled myth of Zarqawi the mastermind
By Adrian Blomfield outside Fallujah
(Filed: 04/10/2004)

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the terrorist leader believed to be responsible for the abduction of Kenneth Bigley, is 'more myth than man', according to American military intelligence agents in Iraq.

Several sources said the importance of Zarqawi, blamed for many of the most spectacular acts of violence in Iraq, has been exaggerated by flawed intelligence and the Bush administration's desire to find "a villain" for the post-invasion mayhem.

US military intelligence agents in Iraq have revealed a series of botched and often tawdry dealings with unreliable sources who, in the words of one source, "told us what we wanted to hear".

"We were basically paying up to $10,000 a time to opportunists, criminals and chancers who passed off fiction and supposition about Zarqawi as cast-iron fact, making him out as the linchpin of just about every attack in Iraq," the agent said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/10/04/wirq04.xml

[yurbud]

20. this is the military unravelling the Bush BS machine

they don't like what's going on, and this is another way of letting the Bushies know.

Let's hope they exhibit the same rebelliousness when they are told to nuke Iran.

[pinniped]

21. Here is your daily dose of al-Zarqawi propaganda.

He doesn't FN exist, at least not in this dimension.

[creeksneakers2]

22. Proof Bush lies about reasons for civil war

Huge story missed in article
All along, the White House has claimed that terrorist attacks in Iraq are part of a Zarqawi and Al Qaeda strategy to cause a civil war. The Bush administration, and the right wing media have pointed to a "captured letter" from Zarqawi to Osama Bin Laden advocating provoking a civil war as proof.

We now have proof that story was fabricated. We have proof the White House has lied about the reasons for civil war in Iraq. The Washington Post skipped over this unpleasant truth. The story in the Post only refers to Zarqawi boasting about suicide attacks.

From the Post:

"One slide in the same briefing, for example, noted that a "selective leak" about arqawi was made to Dexter Filkins, a New York Times reporter based in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about a letter supposedly written by Zarqawi and boasting of suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the Times front page on Feb. 9, 2004."

This is what the Times article actually said:

"BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 8 - American officials here have obtained a detailed proposal that they conclude was written by an operative in Iraq to senior leaders of Al Qaeda, asking for help to wage a ''sectarian war'' in Iraq in the next months.
The Americans say they believe that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian who has long been under scrutiny by the United States for suspected ties to Al Qaeda, wrote the undated 17-page document. Mr. Zarqawi is believed to be operating here in Iraq.

(snip)

The memo says extremists are failing to enlist support inside the country, and have been unable to scare the Americans into leaving. It even laments Iraq's lack of mountains in which to take refuge.

Yet mounting an attack on Iraq's Shiite majority could rescue the movement, according to the document. The aim, the document contends, is to prompt a counterattack against the Arab Sunni minority.

Such a ''sectarian war'' will rally the Sunni Arabs to the religious extremists, the document argues. It says a war against the Shiites must start soon -- at ''zero hour'' -- before the Americans hand over sovereignty to the Iraqis. That is scheduled for the end of June

But there is still time to mount a war against the Shiites, thereby to set off a wider war, he writes, if attacks are well under way before the turnover of sovereignty in June. After that, the writer suggests, any attacks on Shiites will be viewed as Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence that will find little support among the people."

[magellan]

23. Too bad most Iraqis don't believe Zarqawi exists!

From Riverbend's blog, Baghdad Burning:

In any case, should you want to play an April Fool’s Day joke on an Iraqi (albeit a late one- or maybe even next year), I suggest the following:

1. “Guess what?! There’s going to be electricity this summer!!!” (For better effect, it is suggested a candle be broken in half and thrown high into the air with a whoop.)

2. “Guess what?! The Americans have declared they will be gone by 2010 and they won’t leave permanent bases behind!!!” (This should be said with a straight face.)

3. “Guess what?! They didn’t actually find three corpses in the strip of trees two streets away!!!”

4. “Guess what?! The Puppets finally formed a government!!!”

5. “Guess what?! They didn’t actually detain (fill in with the name of a relative, friend- everyone knows someone in prison these days)!!!”

6. "Guess what?! Chalabi solved the gasoline crisis!!!"

7. "Guess what?! No more religious militias- they've been banned from the country!!!" (This should be said in a low voice - just in case)

8. "Great news!! The US is going to make public how the billions of dollars in Iraqi oil money AND donations were 'spent'!!!"

9. "Guess what?! They're going to actually begin reconstructing the country and they estimate it will take 5 years!!!"

10. "Guess what?! They caught Zarqawi!!!" (This will only work on Iraqis who actually think he exists.)

edited html snafu

[complain jane]

25. Does anyone else notice that this story was 'leaked' at just the right

time to take the spotlight away from the headline story about Bush 'leaking' information that is convenient for his politica agenda?

Isn't that funny how that worked that way?

It's convenient in the timing is what it is. I'm sure they know by now that nothing comes of these big revelations, the Bush Kool-Aid drinkers aren't going to be swayed by anything it seems.